Occupational radiation dose statistics from light-water power reactors operating in Western Europe

European Commission Directorate-General For The Information Society And Media Directorate-General For Employment Social Affairs And Inclusion

Description

Nuclear energy and safety
Working conditions

Sujets

• Data collection
• Nuclear reactor technology
• Radiation protection
• Radioactive decay
• Statistics

Informations

• Publié par: EUROPEAN-COMMISSION-DIRECTORATE-GENERAL-FOR-THE-INFORMATION-SOCIETY-AND-MEDIA-DI
• Nombre de lectures: 19
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 3 Mo

Extrait

Commission of the European Communities
radiation protection — 36
Occupational radiation dose statistics
from light-water power reactors
operating in Western Europe Commission of the European Communities
radiation protection — 36
Occupational radiation dose statistics
from light-water power reactors
operating in Western Europe
I. R. Brookes
Central Electricity Generating Board
Gloucestershire GL13 9PB, United Kingdom
T. Eng
Swedish State Power Board
S-162 87 Vällingby
Directorate-General
Employment, Social Affairs and Educatior
Directorate 'Health and Safety'
Luxembourg
1987 Published by the
COMMISSION OF THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES
Directorate-General
Telecommunications, Information Industries and Innovation
Bâtiment Jean Monnet
LUXEMBOURG
LEGAL NOTICE
Neither the Commission of the European Communities nor any person acting on
behalf of then is responsible for the use which might be made of the
following information
Cataloguing data can be found at the end of this publication
Luxembourg : Office for Official Publications of the European Communities, 1987
ISBN 92-825-7209-9 Catalogue number: CD-NA-10971-EN-C
© ECSC-EEC-EAEC, Brussels • Luxembourg, 1987 FOREWORD
The Treaty establishing the European Atomic Energy Community devotes an
entire chapter to the protection of the health of workers and the general
public against the dangers of ionizing radiation - and requires the
Commission of the European Communities to establish uniform basic
standards within the Community.
The Commission's health protection directives are in general based on
recommendations made by the International Commission on Radiological
Protection, United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic
Radiation and other bodies, and form the basis for national legislation
in the Member States of the Community.
The main principles of radiation protection - justification, ALARA (i.e.
As Low As Reasonably Achievable) and limitation of doses - must be
observed in all activities that may result in exposure to radiation.
While the principle of dose limitation is regulated by law, observance of
the ALARAe requires permanent training and information, for
radiation protection officers, and for the exposed workers themselves.
In its efforts to assist the Member States in applying the radiation
protection directives, the Commission supports exchanges of experience
and has endeavoured to record activity-related doses in collaboration
with those in charge of radiation protection at nuclear power stations in
the Member States and other European countries.
Ill Doses were recorded for the work sequences encountered in the operation
of nuclear power stations. Only light water reactors were considered and
an attempt is made to present a scheme that could be applied to all
nuclear power stations of this type.
The findings should, therefore, not be regarded as definitive. In no
event should they be used to assess the effectiveness of radiation
protection. The aim of this survey is to pinpoint the main dose
concentrations to enable those in charge of radiation protection to take
action on a more selective basis.
The Commission would like to thank the two authors, I.R. Brookes and
T. Eng, for their evaluation of and commentary on the data obtained by
the Commission from the questionnaire. It is particularly grateful to the
members of the working party which drew up the questionnaire and to the
operators of the nuclear power stations for their fruitful cooperation in
this important area of radiation protection.
It is hoped that this publication will further stimulate efforts in the
field of radiation protection and persuade those who have not yet done so
to join in supporting this work in future.
Dr E. BENNETT
IV CONTENTS
Page
1. INTRODUCTION 1
2. THE QUESTIONNAIRE 3
3. METHODS OF PRESENTING DATA 7
4. RESULTS 12
4.1 Pressurised Water Reactors 1
4.2 Boiling Water Reactors5
REFERENCES7
APPENDIX A : The Questionnaire as sent to Power Plants 19
APPENDIX B : Data Tabulations, figures 31 1. INTRODUCTION
Since the early days of nuclear power, collective and individual
doses for people engaged in the maintenance and operation of nuclear
power plants have been published by regulatory authorities (for example
in the USA in the series of reports by B. G. Brooks 1979-1982). The
types of data collected have remained essentially the same for many years
but a greater effort is now made to display data in convenient tabular or
graphical form.
In 1979 a small Working Party whose members were drawn from member
states operating Light Water Reactors (LWR's) in the European Community
was convened in order to see whether a similar or perhaps more
comprehensive exercise could or should be carried out for power producing
LWR's in the European Community. On the grounds that all national
radiation protection authorities required the submission of basic n dose data, it was apparent that some compilation of all the
data should be possible. Furthermore, it was apparent that many plants
collected quite comprehensive data often for the purpose of monitoring
their own progress.
The Working Party decided that only by collection of data under a
unified scheme would it ever be possible to properly compare plant
performance and for this reason a Questionnaire was drawn up which
attempted to elicit the maximum of information with the minimum
inconvenience to the plant staff. Another decision made by the Working
Party was to broaden the data base from "European Community LWR's" to
"West European LWR's", to try to take advantage of the considerable
experience being built up in Sweden operating Westinghouse pressurised
water reactors (PWR) and ASEA ATOM boiling water reactors (BWR), in
Finland operating Russian designed PWR's and ASEA ATOM BWR's and in
Switzerland operating Westinghouse PWR's, a Kraftwerk Union PWR and
General Electric BWR's.
At present, most LWR's contribute data with the exception of those
in France. The numbers contributing data have increased steadily and for
1984 the situation is shown in the following table.
- 1 -Number of Plants Percentage of the Country
Total Available Contributing*
* Gt. Britain
-France 0
100 Netherlands 1*
West Germany 11 85
2 50 Spain
100 Italy 2
2 50 Switzerland
Belgium 5 100
Finland A 100
Sweden 10 100
*0ne unit excluded on grounds of small size and atypicality.
^Calculated on number of units, not number of reactor sites.
It is pertinent to ask why such data should be collected when the
statutory obligations for data reporting are already met by each plant.
The Commission of the European Communities (CEC) believes the following
are sound reasons for undertaking this exercise:
(a) To satisfy a desire for individual plants to compare the
performance of their plants with others in the group.
(b) To use the data as a basis for discussions between
contributors with the object of exchanging experience and
discussing ways in which radiation protection in plants might
be improved.
(c) To publish the data under the auspices of the CEC to
demonstrate publicly the results of the continuing efforts of
the nuclear power plant community in Western Europe to
achieve low doses.
(d) To demonstrate that plant operators are seeking to fulfil the
basic safety standards of the CEC (CEC, 1980, 1984). These
require the limitation and optimisation of doses.
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